Peter Jennings provided one of the more balanced reports on the Orrin Hatch hearings regarding the internet wine sales story, but your news guys have still been overly influenced by a powerful senator from Mormon Utah (which sees wine as a sin not a beverage), anti-alcohol fanatic organizations such as MADD (no longer just about keeping drunks off the road..notice their slogans are now anti-drinking, not anti-drunk) and a wholesale monopoly fighting to hold onto the only such special exception to our anti-trust laws.Here's a couple of questions for your reporters to ask:Ask for some examples of minors caught buying licensed beverages via the Internet...that are not a part of a sting involving the assistance of an adult. I've been trying to get the opponents of direct shipping to come with one for 20 years...no luck so far. When a kid wants a case of Bud for Friday night's beer bash, he ain't gonna order it via the Internet, pay up to $35 extra for delivery, have a credit card, lie about his age, and feel safe that no adult will be present to intercept his shipment or that the driver will insist on i.d. Internet sales to minors is just not a reality.

And as regards that 1997 sting you showed, that was set up by a former attorney general (Vacco) who was fronting for a special interest group called ARAA, which is 100% financed by WSWA (the wholesaler's trade assoc.) And Vacco forgot to mention when screaming about interstate shipping, that INTRASTATE shipping has been legal in New York for eons with no apparent problems. Ditto for California, with "intrastate" shipments legal for more than 50 years with virtually no problems involving minors. Now why is it that a shipment from Rochester to NYC, or San FRancisco to Los Angeles, is legal and not a threat to minors, but one from Newark to NYC, or Phoenix to Palm Springs, is illegal and a horrible danger for youth?

This issue is not about minors. This issue is not about taxes (the wineries are willing to pay them, even though other mail order businesses do not). This issue is about maintaining the monopoly of the three or four wholesalers in each state, which take a 25% or more slice out of every bottle of wine, beer and spirits sold. Minors and taxes are red herrings used by a few fat cats to screw consumers once again.

Who's going to take it to the Supreme Court? Have you an inside scoop that some producer or producers have enough money and/or gumption to do it, or to fend off the large producers who are in bed with their distributors and, by virtue of same, in bed with the antis?
The only way this matter will be resolved, I fear, is when the pendulum of our political culture swings once again away from moralism.

I didn't realize the social pendulum had been swinging toward moralism.....my gosh take a look at the present administration.....but, that aside.....I know what you meant. I don't think the right wing churches, and associated groups (MADD SADD)who want to legislate morality, as if drinking and morals are linked, (the basis for the rant I removed) are going to give up soon, don't think we can wait for things to get more moderate.

>>FYI, sent out earlier today to national media outlets and wine trades.
>>
>>Wine Wholesaler Lobby Dupes Press,
>>Public about Direct Wine Sales to Minors
>>
>>March 10, 1999, NAPA, Calif. Jeremy Benson, Executive Director of Free
the Grapes!, commented today on the recent misrepresentation of the wine
industry as â€œbootleggersâ€ when wine is directly shipped across state
borders to consumers. Free the Grapes! is a national, non-profit coalition
of 145,000 wine consumers and associations representing over 1,000 of
Americaâ€™s winemakers whose goal is to ensure access to fine wine.
>>
>>This issue is not about minors. These false and misleading claims seek
to protect the profits of an entrenched state-sanctioned monopoly that no
longer has the financial incentive to distribute for small family-owned
wineries. The wholesaler lobby has attempted in numerous forums, including
a United States Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on March 9th, to portray
the wine industry as a â€œbogeymanâ€ handing out wine to teens through home
delivery.
>>
>>The wholesaler lobby turns a blind eye to direct shipping when it doesnâ€™t
cross state lines. In fact, intrastate delivery is legal in 30 states.
The Americans for Responsible Alcohol Access (ARAA), a self-proclaimed
â€˜safety coalitionâ€™ which is fully-funded by the wholesaler lobby, has been
noticeably silent regarding intrastate deliveries. â€˜Any shipment that
crosses a state border outside (the existing) system is illegalâ€™, (ARAA
press release March 9, 1999). Are we supposed to believe that a shipment
from Los Angeles to San Francisco isnâ€™t a threat to minors, but from L.A.
to Phoenix it is?
>>
>>In states where interstate direct shipping is legal, minor access has not
been a problem. Manny Espinoza, Chief Deputy Director of the California
Department of Alcohol Beverage Control, stated in written testimony to the
Senate Judiciary Committee, â€˜â€¦ We have to date witnessed no measurable
adverse effects on public welfare or safety that could be attributable to
interstate mail order alcohol sales.â€™
>>
>>Katherine Harris, Former Florida State Senator and current Florida
Secretary of State, has also spoken out against making a mockery of the
issue of underage access in defense of self-serving business interests.
â€˜It was inappropriate for the lobbyists of the distributors and wholesalers
to manipulate the Students Against Drunk Drivers (SADD) into pleading their
case.â€™ (April 2, 1998).
>>

>>Since 1963 the number of wineries in the U.S. has exploded from almost
400 to nearly 1,800. Yet during the same time period the number of
wholesalers available to distribute product for wineries shrunk from nearly
11,000 to less than 3,000. The wine wholesalers mistakenly fear that
direct shipping is an effort to dismantle the existing wine distribution
system. On the contrary, direct shipping allows small family-owned
wineries to satisfy growing consumer demand for their wines, which are
often not available in their local markets because they are not stocked by
wholesalers.